Product Description

Create affordable, designer-quality handbags right in your own home -even if you've never sewn a stitch. Using just 4 master patterns, readers learn to use fabrications and embellishments to make everything from vintage styles to fun and trendy beaded bags, from faux fur to fringed bags. Each bag takes cues from major fashion houses, highlighting the best styles from recent decades. Looking for evening drama? Try a crystal clutch. Want to create a conversation piece? Create a fabulous beach bag out of a block-print towel. Complete with shortcuts, tips, and secrets from the Accessories Design staff at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City, this smart guide can turn any reader into a do-it-yourself fashion designer.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #31983 in Books
• Published on: 2002-08-14
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 128 pages

About the Author
Ellen Goldstein-Lynch is the Chairperson of the Accessories Design Department of at the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) in New York. She is an authority on handbags and accessories and been featured on national television and in print. Sarah Mullins is a graduate and faculty member of the Accessories Design Department at the FIT in New York. Sarah has her own line of unique handbags and her passion is experimenting with different combinations of materials in her designs. Nicole Malone has worked for various handbag and fashion designers and produces her own line of handbags and belts under the name "stargon accessories." she is a graduate of, and an instructor at, the accessories design program at the FIT in New York.

Customer Reviews

A great start to making bags!
This book is FAB!! It has pull out patterns, which can be photocopied at various percentages. This means that unlike buying a pattern, which is a set size, you can make any of the bags featured in almost any size. It really does include a huge variety of styles from clutch bags to beach bags, and a load of other styles in between! Another bonus, is the gallery at the back which gives wonderfull inspiration, and really shows what can be done with the patterns. It really is one of the best books to start out with!!

in the bag
I'm new to bag making and this book has given me a good head start. Great instructions and pull out patterns you can use over and over. I felt that the only drawback to this book is that it only covers 4 basic styles of bag. But you can adapt the basic principles to make a different style of bag. Lots of inspiration.

Good basic patterns
The patterns and instructions are really useful. They're clear and simple and don't assume you're an idiot, which is always good. I found the supposedly 'inspirational' ideas - photos of bags that other people had made from the patterns - a bit, well, lame. Still, the main point of the book for me was the patterns and instructions, as I'm still a bit of a beginner at sewing, so it was definitely a good buy.